Chapter 24

The stench got worse the further we went into the drainage pipe and there wasn't a damn thing we could do about it. What was even worse was what we were walking in or at times, on. I won't go into any great detail here, but there was stuff down there that could make a strong man's stomach turn.

I led the way holding a lantern to light our passage in one hand and one of Rory's spears in the other as a walking stick. The footing was slippery and I had no desire to go down into the muck. That meant we took our time and moved forward with care. The first length of pipe went into the cliff for about five hundred feet before things got interesting. The pipe ended up at a junction, where three other pipes emptied into the one where we walking. These new pipes were similar to the first pipe in dimensions but that was it. They were all in different walls and they were all about three feet above the pipe we were in and they were all slightly sloped so that anything in them ran out into main drainage pipe. They were also covered in bars. Luckily they were also in about the same condition as the bars had been over the exit from the sewer and with the tools we'd brought along, we were able to loosen enough stone and mortar to wrench the bars out of the base and sides of the tunnel that we needed to get into. It took time but not much and we were heading deeper into the subterranean maze beneath the Minoan capital within half an hour's time. Again I led the way.

The tunnel we took supposedly emptied from the inner city. The Minoan capital had an inner and outer city and thus two sets of walls. The inner city was the home of the rich and powerful and the generals who supported the king. They lived in massive villas between the inner wall and the curtain wall that surrounded the royal palace and the great tower of Minos, which was the king's final bastion of defence and somewhere up in the dark of this labyrinth of sewers was a channel that fed out from beneath that citadel. If we found it, we'd be that much closer to finding Tagus and Felicity and of course, Nimue's sister.

The tunnel went upward at a gentle grade. It also went around and around in an upward spiral. As we went we passed several minor tunnels that fed into the one we were in. As we went by them we kept silent count, for my intelligence had advised me of where to turn on our subterranean march and I didn't want to miss it.

When we did find it, we'd been climbing for at least an hour and I got the feeling that we'd ascended at least three-quarters of the way up through the rock that formed the base of the city. We still had a considerable distance yet to go, but we were hopeful. When we reached the tunnel, I was forced to smile. The passage was not barred and we didn't have to force our way through it. Again it was three feet up from the floor of the tunnel we had been walking in, and we had to climb into it with care so we wouldn't lose our footing, but that was it. It was still large enough for an average man to walk through, although I was forced to crouch. This slowed our progress a bit.

The good thing was that there was nothing in the tunnels, besides piles of rotting waste that we need to worry about. There was certainly no Minotaur, like in my world's ancient mythos about the creature that had lived in the labyrinth of ancient Minoa. Other than dozens of rats and cockroaches the size of my thumb we encountered little else.

Eventually we arrived in another junction. This time we had to climb. There were iron rungs embedded into the wall and they led upward into the darkness above us. Again I led the way, checking each rung as I climbed. I didn't want any of them giving out. The climb took several minutes as it went up at least five hundred feet. Thankfully we were all on the rungs when we got our first nasty surprise. Half way up the climb, a rush of water shot out of a passage high above us. The water shot across the void between the exit in the wall that we were on and the opposite wall. It splattered there and then flowed down it. Whatever it had been, I was thankful that it missed us completely. I already knew that once we got back to the Windrunner, my mates would be digging out our stash of perfumed soap and I'd be bathing for a bit before any of them would let me near them.

By now we were under the inner city and at the point where we needed to work our way under the citadel. This was in fact the most dangerous part of our endeavours. The drains from the citadel were smaller in size. We could still get through them but we were going to have to crawl. That wasn't the dangerous part. The dangerous part was the fact that the drains were emptied more often from the palace than from the other sections of the city. Basically the palace had more water to waste and they used it to flush things way. The risk was that a wall of water like the one that had shot out of the drain as we were climbing might hit us and send us flying back out of the passage. If that happened, one of us would probably get injured at the very least. To minimize the chance of that happening, I had everyone tie a rope about their waists, linking them to the person in front of them. I also made certain that everyone was staggered down the line from the heaviest person, which was me to the lightest person, who was Kola. Hopefully if something happened, Rory and I could act as an anchor for the others.

We did get wet but not as badly as we feared and we certainly didn't get swamped. Eventually we made it to the end of the line. This time it was a round chamber that had half a dozen pipes feeding into it. The chamber was only big enough for one person to fit through at a time. As for the six pipes they were only about a foot in diameter, but that was okay as we weren't going any further underground. There was a culvert lid above us and we were going out of it, or we would once I'd shifted it.

It took some doing but I did it. Once it was lifted and pushed out of the way, I scrambled out. The culvert opened in a cellar that wasn't lit. My lantern showed a wide chamber with torches in the wall and stuff packed to one side. After a quick look around, I pulled Rory up and then he and I pulled everyone else up. It didn't take long and I sighed with relief when Kola was finally with us. Now we could rest.

Kola and Caitlin lit the torches that lined the chambers walls to give us a little more light. The room was essentially a storeroom. If we were where my informants had told me we would be, we should be under the palace. For now we paused and searched the room. Caitlin found some rags in a corner that were reasonably clean and dry and we used them to clean ourselves up. Then we shared some water and ate the meagre rations that we'd brought with us. The climb had taken several hours and by now we were exhausted.

The plan was for us to rest for a bit. Even though it was later in the day, it was still not evening and I really didn't want to skulk about the palace during the daytime. With luck there would be fewer people about during the night. In fact, if we were really lucky the king might even practice the same habits of his people and go to bed early. If so, it would really make our life easier. In the meantime, we took a nap and once more I took first watch.

We didn't sleep long. Only three hours at best, if my estimates were correct. It was however enough to revitalize us and hopefully sufficient time for evening to have arrived. We'd learn that soon enough. With a final check of our equipment, we headed out.

The room exited into a narrow corridor that ran from the east to the west, or so I'd been told. The eastern passage led to more storerooms, while the western passage led to a flight of stairs that took you up out of the depths of the citadel. According to my informant we were still deep beneath the palace and if we were lucky, we could move about unseen for quite a bit. Personally, I was hoping to run into someone very soon, so I could confirm where we actually were and to update my intelligence.

We went west and found the flight of stairs and climbed them. The stairs were in a circular chamber that reached upward and the stairs ran about the walls. We followed them to the next level and then paused and had a listen. When we heard nothing at all we moved onward continuing up to the next level to see what we could find. There we paused again and listened. This time we heard voices from down the corridor towards the east. With a smile to Nimue, who was standing beside me on the steps, we headed towards the voices and their owners, hoping to take them by surprise.

We found the speakers in a room similar to the chamber we'd come in through. From the sound of it there were only two speakers and they were doing inventory. Nimue and I crept up on them while the others kept watch. Boy, were they surprised to see us.

"What the..." gasped one man on seeing me. His face instantly went pale and I knew from the way he was looking at me that I must look horrible. Inwardly I smiled at that.

"Shut up," I told him and his companion, "or I'll kill you both where you're standing."

Both men gasped at that threat and to help them get the point, I brandished my hatchet about in my right hand, making a few swipes in air with the weapon. Regrettably the chamber in which they were standing had a low ceiling and it made the use of my longsword impractical. Still I think they got the idea, especially when Nimue waved her sabre about, and they did as I told them.

"Now listen up my friends," I said to them as gruffly as I could manage. "I want to know a few things and you're going to tell me what I want to know. If you don't then I'll kill you and go and ask someone else. Do you understand?"

They did and they cooperated. The first thing I did was to split them up. I put one man in another room with Nimue and Zahra and Rory and I kept the other one for myself and my other two mates. I let Nimue question the other man and when I was done with mine we compared notes. Amazingly, neither man had tried to lie. That surprised me for a second or two, and then I had an epiphany. Both men were outworlders and they were slaves. I smiled at that and wondered just how far I could trust them.

The two men were Richard Adams and Josh Winslow. They'd been on Game World for about ten years and for nine of those years they'd been slaves in this palace. It turned out that they had a wealth of intelligence to share with me and once I gave them my spiel about what Game World was really about, I had two more recruits for the slave rebellion. Both men wanted to help me and that just made me happy.

It turned out that my inner clock worked fine. It was evening now, although not as late as I hoped it to be. The sun was still up and people were scurrying about on the upper levels. As far as the king keeping the same habits of his people, we didn't luck in on that idea. The man liked to party and tonight he was having a feast to celebrate his newest acquisition to his menagerie. That's right; the bastard was celebrating getting Tagus and Felicity given to him. To our pleasant surprise, the guest of honour would be Alexander of Lufkin. How lucky could I get?

I decided to trust Richard and Josh. The hairs on the back of my neck weren't sticking up and in consideration of the righteous indignation they had expressed on hearing the truth of the situation here on Game World I was inclined to believe that they were truthful in what they'd been telling me and what they said they would be willing to do for me. The two men had confirmed that we were below the palace and the citadel. Currently we were in the main storerooms of the palace where much of the food for the garrison was stored in case of siege. Richard and Josh had been sent down to inventory stock as a form of busy work. The fact was that the palace had an abundance of slaves and most of them were underemployed. I let Richard head off to speak with someone and I was pleased to see him return half an hour later with six other men. After a quick introduction, I learned that the men were also slaves working in the palace and they were willing to help us. From them we learned that supper was just beginning to be served.

That piece of news gave us an inclination as to how much time was left to us. Richard had told me that the king would feast first before showing off his new prizes. That gave us about two hours to move through the palace and get into position. It also gave me two hours to find Nimue's sister.

We got lucky there. One of the men worked in the king's menagerie, seeing to the needs of the humanoid attractions. He knew all the passages that ran beneath the palace and which one's that led into the compound where the king kept his prizes. The fact was that the king preferred not to see his slaves unless they were attending him and only his chosen few did that. The rest kept out of sight by using hidden passages and stairwells. The man even showed us that he had keys to the doors that we needed to pass through. With them we'd have very few problems getting where we wanted to go, besides one or two guards that would need to be eliminated. To me that wasn't a problem.

My party and I had a quick chat. There was no way I was going to split up our team. There were only six of us and we had no idea how many people there might be in the palace in the form of guards. We needed to get to the menagerie as quickly as possible so we could rescue Nimue's sister and then get to the king's banquet hall to rescue Tagus and Felicity. I also needed to know the situation above ground at all times, just in case an alarm was sounded and Tagus and Felicity were taken somewhere else. Richard volunteered to do that. He knew the hidden passages well and he would watch the entrance to the grand banquet hall in secret and if anything changed from normal, he would raise his own alarm and warn us. With that agreed upon, we headed out.

Hugo was the man leading us. He took us down the corridor to the east and then took a side corridor to the south. This one ended in a flight of stairs that led upwards to a gallery that overlooked the king's garden and the menagerie. He warned us that there would be three guards standing on the gallery, spaced out along it at even intervals, but their attention wouldn't be on the door through which we would exit, but the gardens below. Forewarned I made my plan.

When Hugo opened the heavy wooden door that exited to the gallery, he stepped to the side so that he would be out of the way. Rory stepped into the space left by him and fired his crossbow from his shoulder. His bolt flew through the space between him and the guard closest to him. That guard had just begun to turn to see what was going on when the bolt slammed into his chest and punctured his lung. The impacted of the bolt spun the man about and dropped him to the ground.

The moment Rory had fired, he'd stepped to the side as well, vacating the open door and clearing it for Nimue, who stepped out into the gallery with her bow drawn and nocked with an arrow. Even as the first man fell, her arrow flew from her weapon and sped across the space that separated her and the second guard. This man had been alerted by the falling of his comrade and had turned to see what had happened as well. Nimue's arrow drove through his exposed throat severing his windpipe and his major arteries. Blood spurted everywhere as the man was thrown back by the force of the arrow hitting him.

That left one guard at the end of the gallery. The man had seen his two colleagues die and he chose to flee instead of to stay and fight. Unfortunately for him, he needed to reach the far door and open it to escape and I had no intentions of letting him. As Nimue stepped out of the doorway, I stepped into the gallery, bringing up my longbow as I did. My arrow struck the man in the back before he had even run five feet. The arrow punched through his boiled leather jerkin and then his body and then the front of his armour. The man was dead before he knew it.